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Salt is more than mere seasoning; it's a full bouillabaisse comprised of bits and pieces of James Bond, The Manchurian Candidate, The Bourne Identity, TV's 24, and the Nelson DeMille novel The Charm School. What begins with a delicious appetizer, ...

Saw is for hard-gore horror aficionados only. To appreciate Saw in its full gory, you have to have a penchant for productions that bask in the traditions of the Grand Guignol. While most of the film relies more on psychological tension and terror...

When the filmmakers started out two films ago, the Scary Movies were funny. Since then, it has been a rapid decline through mediocrity into near-unwatchability. Absent for this third installment are the Wayans Brothers, who are replaced by David ...

Scary Movie 4 is better than Scary Movie 3. Writing that sentence falls into the category of damning with faint praise, because the experience of sitting through the third installment of the comedy series was as pleasant as spreading organic ferti...

One reason why Wes Craven’s 1996 slasher film, Scream, met with success was that Craven (and screenwriter Kevin Williamson) found a way to enliven things by incorporating a tongue-and-cheek “meta” aspect to the proceedings. In the course of ...

You know a franchise has exceeded its “sell by” date when all the titles seem to blur together and the newest installments seem like remakes of the older ones. That being said, Scream VI is possibly the most entertaining entry into the lon...

At the tender age of seven, Josh Waitzkin (Max Pomeranc) becomes fascinated by the game of chess. Without giving up little league baseball, he learns how to play, hanging out with Vinnie (Laurence Fishburne) and a group of speed chess hustlers...

One could make a compelling argument that The Secret Life of Walter Mitty does what a good remake should do: it takes the essential premise of the original and, while retaining some of the names and touchstones of its predecessor, moves in a new di...

As Shaun of the Dead illustrated, it is possible to make a horror comedy that is both funny and scary. Severance, while not nearly as successful as Edgar Wright and Simon Pegg's zombie movie, manages to mix in a few good gags with the requisite go...

When it comes to The Simpsons, longevity is an asset few can ignore. 18 years old and counting, the TV series has carved its niche into pop culture. Most of today's high school students hadn't been born when The Simpsons debuted as filler on Trac...